The Longest Nap
by ClassicJest
Summary: Linhardt finds himself in a confusing situation.
1. Chapter 1

"Are you sure you can carry all of those?"

"I'm -" Caspar heaved, "I'm fine." His tightly flexed arms holding all 17 of the various books telling a different story.

Linhardt shrugged. "If you say so." He began to walk out of the library, candlelight guiding his way. He paused for a moment, then looked over his shoulder. "Oh, ah, thank you, Tomas."

"It's no problem, sonny!" Tomas' elbows creaked into the worn out wooden library desk, his grin almost too friendly. Linhardt found was too tired to care about that sort of thing, and kept making his way out.

Linhardt almost made an effort to walk quietly for the sake of those sleeping in their dorm rooms around them, but with Caspar following him they'd surely wake anyways. "So Caspar," he turned around to face the very fiend he was attempting to make conversation with, but realized the only thing he was facing was the many books "Actually, I can probably take a few of those for you."

"Nope! I'm never gonna get ripped if I never train!"

He clicked his tongue. "You're never going to get ripped if you trip and bash your head because you can't see where you're going."

Caspar peeked out from behind the stack. "I'd probably get the nastiest paper cut ever... Maybe you could grab a few books." His cheeky grin only looked more ridiculous when it was one of the few things actually visible, all behind him and beneath his shoulders lost to the darkness.

Linhardt barely suppressed a gag from picturing the nasty cut described, but grabbed books anyways until finally they'd evened the stack out enough for Caspar to actually be able to see where he was going.

Linhardt let his mind travel, having walked these halls so many times that it didn't matter if he was out of it or not. That didn't last long, with Caspar interrupting by calling out about the sky, causing him to realize they'd already made it to the bottom level of dorms.

He looked up, pleasantly surprised by the medley of purple and orange streaks, pink outlining the clouds.

Out of the corner of his eye he noticed Caspar looking at him with the same expression he'd assume himself to have been making seconds ago. "What are you looking at?" He asked, genuinely confused.

Caspar nearly jumped, but tried to recover by giving a playful wink. Linhardt now felt it was safe to assume that the hot pink dusting his cheeks wasn't only from the sky's light.

He decided to give him a break from the embarrassment. "Come on, let's get these books inside." Linhardt opened the door to his room, and took a seat on the bed. "You can just put them on my desk."

He allowed himself to close his eyes for a quick moment, letting the grin he was holding back be free.

* * *

.

.

.

Apparently a quick moment turned into more, because here he was, tucked in to his thick blanket, listening to the chirping of birds outside his window. He rolled onto his side, hoping to go back to sleep, but realized that waking would be inevitable, as his mind wouldn't let him drift back into the world of dreams.

He scrunched his eyes, then opened them. The whole room looked foggy and muddy, so he rubbed his eyes with his hands and tried again, getting a disappointingly similar result.

Upon closer inspection the foggy look was caused by cobwebs that were littered all over the corners of his rooms, and draped over the very stack of books Caspar had placed on his desk the night before. Grass had crept its way between the cracks of the wood planks that made up the floor, and the gaps in the walls seemed to be bigger and plenty more rotten than they'd ever been before.

Linhardt looked up to his ceiling. Holes had been rotted into it, somehow exposing the sky despite the second floor of the dormitory being in between his room and the sky.

Things like these did not happen overnight, so Linhardt figured it must be a dream. He stood up finally, still dressed in his uniform that he'd never changed out of the night prior. Whoever had tucked him in - likely Caspar - seemed to have taken his shoes off for him as well, so he slipped those on. He took a moment to run his hands through his hair, and found it to be terribly matted down on the back.

He tried to open his door, but it wouldn't budge. After a few attempts of pushing with his hands, he turned and slammed his whole body against it.

The whole area outside his room was covered in rotten wood scraps and various weeds. Linhardt turned around to check out the upstairs floor, only to realize that no such floor was there any longer, replaced by torn planks of wood and tree branches.

His heart began pounding, eyes widening. Suddenly the situation made sense. It was likely a hurricane. A hurricane that he slept through, and was too late to help out at all. Caspar slept on the top floor…

Linhardt booked it around to the other side of the dorm rooms, but found nothing there, except for an unusual amount of overgrowth.

The suspicion came back. A hurricane doesn't explain away cobwebs and plants, for the most part. The wood wouldn't be rotten the night after. And although this was embarrassingly not a very strong point, Linhardt doubted he could sleep through a whole hurricane…

He realized that he had pulled himself into a full-out Hanneman style pose with his fist resting on his chin, only snapped out of his thoughts by a.. Mewing noise?

He looked down to see a black and white cat rubbing up against his leg. He bent down to scratch its chin, but instead got swatted across the arm. Like Felix, he supposed. The cat ran off into the woods, so Linhardt followed. Not like this situation could get much odder.

Even though he'd explored almost every inch of the monastery, he could hardly recognize this place. There had been a path that the professor had walked them through, having the class practice archery by hunting forest animals to be served in the dining hall later those nights. A few times he and Caspar had explored around, finding rare mushrooms and fungus and whatever else Linhardt had attached himself to researching.

But as he walked through now, along where that path had been, mushrooms and moss were scattered on overgrown roots, and he had to be careful to maneuver around large bushes and low hanging branches. Still, he was careful not to lose sight of the cat, now dubbed Felix.

Sunlight broke through densely packed branches, causing Linhardt to resort to blocking it out with his hands. It felt like hours had passed walking through the former path.

He leaned forward and squinted. Leaning up against a soft pink painted building was an orange haired boy holding a dark crimson book in his hands. As Linhardt stepped out of the woods he realized he recognized the boy. "FERDINAND!"

Promptly Ferdinand jumped, nearly dropping his book. He looked around, knees wobbling. He spotted Linhardt, looked at him with the face of a shaken foal, then opened a door Linhardt didn't notice existed and quickly shut himself inside.

"Hmph, some help." Linhardt muttered, shaking his head.

Felix meowed in response, then went after a little white moth that had been fluttering around by the edge of the forest.

Linhardt walked up the the pink building and began knocking, but when knocks went by ignored, they turned into him absolutely hammering his fists on the white door. It wasn't until now that he realized just how desperate for answers he was.

He paused for a moment to take a breath, but ended up falling to his knees, his whole front leaning on the door. He hadn't noticed how exhausted he was, and began to consider a nap again, but the ground of an odd stone didn't want to offer much comfort for his tired knees only covered by the thin monastery uniform that stunk of all the grime he'd slept the night before.

His eyes began closing on their own… even though he knew he'd be hurting and dizzy when he woke up, and he didn't know where he was, a nap became a real option…

Suddenly his head was bashed against the rough ground. Only afterwards did he realize that the door he had leaned on had been swung open, edge smashing right into his forehead.

The sun that had once only been a small glimmer through the forest was now feeling like a lantern against his eyes. He could just barely make out a somewhat short figure standing above him. He brought a hand up to feel his forehead, and if the hit didn't knock him out then he certainly fainted when he realized that fresh, gooey blood dripped from his fingers.

* * *

.

.

Linhardt groaned upon waking. He'd barely been dreaming, just reliving a blurry and mildly incorrect version of his trip through the woods. Aches of pain seeped through his muscles.

"He has awoken! Come over and look, he has finally woken up!" a voice that clearly belonged to Ferdinand called out, causing a few click-clackity footsteps to come closer.

Linhardt finally opened his groggy eyes. Above him stood Ferdinand and Hilda, both dressed somewhat differently than how they usually dressed, although he couldn't make out the details.

"Thank gosh, I wasn't ready for my first manslaughter." Hilda said, tagging on a few giggles.

Linhardt yawned. "Where am I?" the ceiling was clearly not from the monastery, it being painted a soft green unlike any that he recognized.

"Oh man.." Hilda knelt down, leaning over him. "Do you remember anything? Do you know what your name is?"

Linhardt rolled his eyes the best he could. "I'm not an amnesiac, Hilda."

They both flinched back.

He rolled his eyes once more, then brought a hand to his head. A bandage was wrapped around his forehead. Suddenly he remembered all too well the dripping, hot blood. He felt almost as it he was going to throw up already just thinking about it.

"Anyways, you still haven't answered my question." Linhardt pushed his arms down on the cushion-like surface beneath him, sitting himself up.

Now that he could actually see what was going on around him, he found himself to be in a quaint green and white room, with small chairs and tables strewn about. A long table like one that a shopkeeper would stand behind was to his right, and to his right was another wall with chalkboards advertising coffees and teas, where a door in the center was wide open. He looked down and realized he sat on a brown thing that seemed to be a cross between a sofa and bench.

Hilda took a seat in one of the two chairs in front of him where Dorothea sat as well.

Dorothea didn't bat an eye from the odd slab she held in her hands. "Are you sure you don't know this guy?"

"Dorothea, he was in the woods! Just look at him!" Ferdinand gestured his hands towards Linhardt.

Linhardt rolled his eyes again. "Alright, I'm not entirely sure what's going on here, but if you're just going to keep acting like I'm not here and you don't know me, then I'm just going to leave." He swung his legs off of the couch-bench abomination and onto the ground.

"You can't leave now!" Hilda threw up her hands as if to hold him back. "You're probably still concussed!"

Linhardt sighed. "Alright then, can you get me a healer, then?"

Dorothea perked up an eyebrow. "Like, a doctor?"

He leaned back in his seat. "I don't know. Just get Manuela."

Dorothea looked up from her rectangle with a concerned expression. Ferdinand turned to look him straight in the eyes, looking a bit wary again.

Linhardt sighed once more. "Or Marianne, I guess." he wasn't about to be picky when it came to healing.

Hilda looked confused.

All three of the idiot trio looked at each other, then back at him.

Ferdinand forced an awkward grin. "We're just going to go speak in the other room quickly… don't leave whilst we are gone! Ha. Ha."

They all got up and walked away as quickly as one could while trying to be casual.

"You better be getting me medical attention!" Linhardt said in a tone that walked the line between yelling and just speaking.

He shook his head. Whatever, if they weren't going to get a healer, or a _doctor _as Dorothea had said, then he would get one for himself. He stretched his arms up for a moment, then pushed himself up out of his seat.

The first few steps he took were wobbly, making him feel like a newborn fawn. He held himself up by propping his arms against the chalkboard-covered wall.

Eventually he made it over to the open door. He stepped outside, nearly falling due to how weak his legs still felt.

The ground in front of him was still covered in that odd sort of rock, except it was a darker, ashier grey colour. Across that rock was a variety of multicolored buildings, all with doors wide open.

He took a step forward onto the rocky ground, when suddenly a huge red… _thing _about as tall as a horse wooshed centimeters away from his face, making a noise like a wyvern's grumble. And before he knew it, he was down again.

* * *

.

.

"Mercie, he's awake!"

Linhardt took in the scent of a sweet, fruity tea. He stretched as much as one could whilst hardly moving at all. Finally he opened his tired eyes to be greeted with a dimly lit room, where Annette sat in a big, grey cushioned loveseat not far from him. "Hi."

She smiled in a rather cute manner. "How're you doing?"

He put in the effort to smile a slight bit. "As well as one can for having passed out twice in one day." He pushed himself upright on the big plush sofa he sat on.

A tall, light haired girl walked into the room holding a few mugs, likely the source of the tea smell. She handed a mug to him with "Cat person" painted on it in loopy writing, then handed a mug to Annette, keeping the last one for herself as she sat down on the loveseat with the other girl.

She did look quite familiar, and he could swear he'd seen her around the monastery…

He snapped his fingers. "Ah, that's it! You're Mercedes, right?"

Both of the girls looked surprised much like the trio of fools had been. Mercedes smiled a bit sheepishly. "I'm sorry, but I don't remember meeting you."

Linhardt shook his head. "That's happened a lot today. I'm not sure if this is just some unfortunate joke on me or a dream." He started, but realized that they would indeed want answers. "We met at Garreg Mach monastery, don't you remember? Same with you, Annette."

Annette quirked up an eyebrow. "Isn't that the old church grounds in the woods that nobody could find?"

Mercedes nodded. "Yes, but I suppose that having passed out twice in one day would confuse someone like that…"

Linhardt felt the back of his head where his hair was still matted down quite badly. "Whatever. By any chance would one of you happen to have a comb I could borrow? You can probably tell my hair isn't in the best of conditions right now."

"Oh, I'll go and get one for you."

Mercedes began to stand, but Annette interrupted her.

"You got the tea, I can get the comb, It's only fair! Be right back." Annette got up and left the room.

"So anyways," Said Linhardt,"Why am I here?"

Mercedes smiled sheepishly again. "Oh, I suppose I should have explained that already." She giggled a bit at her own mistake. "Annie and I saw you passed out by the side of the road with a bloody bandage on your head,"

He felt grossed out.

"And I just knew something was wrong, of course, and because I don't think that it would have been a good idea to drive for an hour just to get you to the hospital, we brought you home so I could check on you. I do know a fair bit of medicine and how to treat patients, after all."

"I see. Thanks. But, ah, what is a hospital? I cannot say I have ever heard the term before." Linhardt felt awkward making eye contact, so he instead focused on the thick purple curtains covering the windows.

Mercedes brought her legs back up onto her chair and leaned them comfortably on the armrest to her left. "It's where people who need a doctor go. I'm assuming you remember what a doctor is?"

Ah. _Remember._ Mercedes assumed that he just had amnesia. Not a ridiculous assumption considering she found him passed on with a bandage over his bloody head. "Yes, I know what a doctor is."

Mercedes smiled.

"So anyways, what was that about Garreg Mach being an abandoned church ground?"

She sipped her tea out of the white-blue spotted mug in her hands. "Yeah, our town used to be a pretty popular tourist attraction because there were rumors that the church of Garreg Mach was out in the woods nearby. Of course, nobody could ever find it, and eventually the summer tourists just stopped coming. But still, a lot of high school kids still like to go out into the woods and do ghost rituals to try to summon the spirits that might have lived there."

She shook her head, then continued. "I remember I used to do those when I was in high school, but nowadays I don't quite as much because Annie isn't a fan of ghosts. I mostly save it for when I'm having a night out with my friends… Oh, sorry, I kind of trailed off there!"

"It's alright." Linhardt nodded. It was pretty obvious that Mercedes was not sorry anyways.

Annette walked in. "Gosh, I could swear you were hiding these on purpose!" She walked over and handed a comb to him. "Here's a comb for you, uh… Sorry, did you say your name?"

"It's Linhardt. Linhardt von Hevring." He immediately accepted the comb and tried to work out the knots in his ponytail-thing on the back of his head, but they just wouldn't work with him.

Annette made a face of disgust. "That's not going to come out… I think you're just going to have to cut it off…"

Linhardt sighed. He took out the silk ribbon tied in his hair. "Alright. Get the scissors."

She flinched. "I didn't mean right now! I'm not a hairdresser!"

Mercedes pulled out another one of those odd rectangles from the pocket on her sweater. "I think I know a few people who do haircuts… just give me one moment."

Linhardt shook his head. "Whoever you choose better not be responsible for Lorenz's atrocity."

Annette smiled sheepishly, walking over to the loveseat again. "So uh, why is there a bandage on your head and... why do you know everybody?"

Linhardt sighed for what felt like the hundredth time today. "Well, I woke up this morning in my dorm room at Garreg Mach,"

They both looked confused.

"Like I do _every morning, _you know, to go to class at the Officer's Academy. But when I woke up today, everything was all rotten and destroyed as if I'd slept for a century. So I got up, looked around the place, then decided to follow a cat into the woods. At the end of the woods was a building, and I saw Ferdinand leaning against it, so I called out his name to ask him what was going on, but he ended up getting scared and running inside. I knocked on the door, but when I stopped knocking someone bashed the door into my head." He yawned. "Actually, I might just have a nap now…"

Annette cocked her head to the side. "You can't just stop halfway through a story! Especially not on a cliffhanger!"

"Fine, fine. So I woke up inside the building with a bandage on my head. Dorothea, Hilda and Ferdinand were there, but none of them would get me medical attention, so I left, then passed out. Then you found me. The end." He yawned and stretched out. "Alright, I'm going to have a nap. Goodnight."

Mercedes looked unsettled.

Annette gasped. "You can't go to sleep now! I have so many unanswered questions! And you didn't even answer one of the first questions!"

"They can wait. Goodnight."


	2. Chapter 2

Linhardt's eyes snapped open like the door he heard slamming. Apparently yesterday wasn't a dream as made apparent by the fact that he was still on Mercedes' couch, but the room was easier to make out now that the curtains were tied back and everything wasn't blanketed in purple.

"Sorry, that, ah, wasn't on purpose!"

Linhardt turned slightly to look over the armrest of the couch. He could see into the doorway where Annette had came from with the comb yesterday now, where the walls were a tacky yellow and white tile like a noble's bathroom floor. Dimitri stood in the house doorway, looking embarrassed. He wasn't wearing his usual blue cape and monastery uniform, instead wearing a hooded blue sweater. Linhardt couldn't make out the rest as his vision was somewhat blocked by the odd lamp on the table by the couch that he didn't care enough to move.

Dedue stepped in the house doorway. He as well dressed differently, wearing a white jacket and a dull red shirt. He closed the door politely behind himself and nodded to someone who was too far from the living doorway for Linhardt to be able to see. He turned to look into the living room and made eye contact with him.

Mercedes peeked out into the living room. "Oh, you're awake!" She walked in and sat down on the loveseat, still wearing a fluffy sweater the color of pegasus milk, causing him to realize that it wasn't even yesterday that the whole shenanagin had happened."Annette went out to pick up Dimitri and Dedue. Do you know them?"

Linhardt fidgeted with the silk ribbon that somehow hadn't fallen out of his grip while he slept. "Yes, I've heard of them."

Mercedes smiled awkwardly. "Right."

"So, do tell me, why did you invite guests over when there's a mysterious injured man on your couch?"

"Oh, well it does sound a bit odd when you put it like that!" she clasped her hands in her lap. "Dedue does haircuts, so he came over to cut your hair."

Linhardt raised a brow. "And Dimitri?"

"Well, what can I say? You can't separate the two." She giggled softly.

Dedue, Dimitri and Annette all walked into the living room, Annette taking a seat on the loveseat next to Mercedes again, and Dimitri sitting on the only scrap of couch that Linhardt wasn't taking up. It was odd seeing the heir to Faerghus wearing clothing that almost looked like that of a commoner's, although he couldn't say that he really ever had seen fabrics quite like those.

Dedue didn't smile, but his face somehow still gave off the same impression as if he had. "Please come into the kitchen, Linhardt."

Linhardt got up and brought himself into the kitchen, feeling like a marionette both in that he felt dragged, and as if he were the center of attention. Additionally, he was dressed oddly compared to the others.

Linhardt would have stopped when he walked into the room to admire how odd everything was - from the shiny steel blocks and the framed glass reading "Some call it a mess, I call it a kitchen" that contradicted how clean it all seemed - but Dedue was following behind him, and it would be terribly annoying of him to stop in front of somebody. He plopped himself down in one of the wooden chairs at the table and decided to focus his attention on the porcelain cats on the table.

"So... how do you want me to cut your hair? Or would you just like for me to try to unmat it?"

Ah, yes. That was a thing that commoner parents let their children do, right? Linhardt was used to his mother picking out his haircuts for him, but to choose one for himself…. He could change it up completely, perhaps getting a silly bowl cut, or shave it all completely. The possibilities are truly endless.

"I would like if you could just unmat it, please." What a wild child he was.

He could hear Dedue shuffling around in the black bag not far from the chair, likely getting scissors or a brush.

Linhardt brought his arms on the tables and rested his head in his hands just how mother would tell him not to.

—-

"Alright, I am all finished."

Dedue sighed, bringing Linhardt out of his trance.

He'd managed to stay zoned-out for a good while, considering that when he looked up he saw Annette, Mercedes and Dimitri all seated at the table in front of him.

"Were you sleeping with your eyes open or something like that?" Dimitri laughed a little as he spoke.

"I may as well have been, with how deep I was in my thoughts." Linhardt shook his head gently, pleasantly surprised at how his hair now functioned again normally as it had just the day before. Considering that he asked for exactly that, it should not really have come as a shock. He turned and looked over his shoulder to Dedue, who looked relieved about being finished. "Thank you, Dedue."

Dedue nodded. "You are welcome." He sat down at Linhardt's right, leaving him quite close to Dimitri.

Mercedes got up and went over to the odd steel blocks. "What would you two like to drink?"

"I'll just have water, please." Linhardt let himself slouch over with his head on the table.

Annette looked a bit peeved. "You better not be having another nap!"

"I can't make any guarantees."

Dedue looked as if he had already had enough of everything. "I would also appreciate some water, please."

"So, Linhardt, how old are you?" Dimitri rested his head on his knuckles, making him look concerningly similar to Sylvain.

"Sixteen. Why?"

"Well, I was just talking to a friend of mine on the phone about, say, twenty minutes ago, and I explained to him what you explained to me of your situation, and he said his father would be willing to let you stay with him should you not find your parents or whoever it is you live with."

Linhardt though for a moment. Considering the fact that everyone he knew seemed to have forgotten about him, and that he was completely unfamiliar with the world around him, he doubted he would find his parents. "Hmm… What is this boy's name?"

"I… don't know how that would affect things much, as I doubt you know him, but his name is Ashe Ubert."

Linhardt nodded, albeit quite awkwardly considering his head was still on the table. "I know him. I'd like to stay with him."

Mercedes turned and smiled rather pityingly. "Linhardt… You did explain some of your situation, but I feel like you're leaving out quite a few details. Would you be alright with sharing at least a bit more, please?"

Linhardt sighed and sat back up. "Alright, well what do you want to know? I did already tell you what happened to me today."

She sighed. "Well, if you say that's the truth…"

He was starting to get irritated at this point. "Well, why would I lie about that? What motivation could I possibly have?"

Annette chimed in. "Well, you could be a criminal. Or maybe you ran away from home and don't want to go back."

He frowned slightly. Those would be good reasons for him to run away. He was running out of good points to make. "Well, alright, but I'm not a criminal."

Annette remained on the case. "So you're not discounting the possibility you ran away from home!"

"I didn't do that either!"

Dimitri frowned. "If he doesn't want to talk about it, then it would be mean to force him to."

Promptly both girls looked embarrassed.

"Sorry, I shouldn't have prodded." Mercedes gave a wistful look and gave both Dedue and him the water they had asked for a short while ago.

After a short, awkward pause in all conversation, Linhardt attempted to cut the silence, even if just for the others' sake, "Anyways, are we just speaking hypotheticals? Last I recall, Lanato isn't quite present anymore, and Ashe still has little siblings, so I'm not sure how you expect this all to work out."

Immediately after he regretted bringing that up, as the topic of someone's recently deceased father was not much less awkward than prying into someone's upsetting background.

But luckily for him, the only reaction he got were confused reactions from Dimitri and Dedue, with that being the most expressive Dedue had been since arrival at Mercedes' house.

Linhardt sighed again. "I'm guessing that Lonato isn't dead."

"No, he isn't..." Added Dedue.

"Alright then." He had enough of explaining himself, so he decided not to.

"Regardless of all of that, we were not speaking hypotheticals." Dimitri smiled somewhat. He then turned to look at Mercedes. "Are you sure he's alright?"

Mercedes shrugged. "To be honest, I'm not entirely sure that taking a random stranger into my house was even a good idea."

It definitely wasn't, Linhardt thought.

She continued, "I think we should have a professional check on him at some point, but I suppose it can wait."

Everyone seemed to agree, between the few nods and the lack of anyone voicing any objections. Linhardt felt that it was ridiculous that nobody saw anything wrong with keeping a concussed stranger with strange memories out of a hospital, but oh well, it is what it is, he thought again.

After another moment of silence Dedue stood up and nodded to Dimitri, causing him to stand as well.

"Well, I think me and Dedue are going to take our leave now. Linhardt, if you'd like, we can take you to Ashe's house now."

Linhardt stood up and tied his hair back in the white ribbon it was tied in before. "Sure." He walked over to the doorway where the other two boys had gone.

Dedue began to open the open the door. "Thank you for having us over."

Mercedes smiled. "Oh, no, thank you for helping out poor Linhardt. Goodbye, boys."

Linhardt took that as a cue. He turned back to Dedue. "Ah, yes. Thanks." He turned again. "Bye."

Dimitri waved, and Dedue said his goodbyes. Finally, they were on their way out the door.

Linhardt kept his eyes to the ground. This proved to be a bad technique, he realized, as he bumped into Dimitri.

"Oh, sorry, I hope you don't mind taking the back seat."

Linhardt looked to his side. Beside them was a large, shiny blue thing, that appeared to be the same size as the red thing from earlier.

Dimitri grabbed a handle and pulled it open, revealing that the thing was hollow with dark grey cushioned seats in it.

They waited for a moment.

"...Aren't you going to get in?" Dimitri looked at Linhardt as if _he_ was the stupid one.

Linhardt did not like this identity of a fool, and really did want things to move along, so he stepped in, in the process he bumped his head on the top of the odd thing.

Dimitri then stepped into the thing, but instead was on the front left seat instead of the back one. Dedue was also in already to Dimitri's right.

Then began a loud purring sound. Linhardt looked up to see Dimitri's eyes staring him down in the little tilted mirror at the front.

"Are you buckled?"

Linhardt could only respond with "What?".

"Is your seatbelt buckled up?" Dimitri repeated himself.

Linhardt sighed. "I still do not know what you mean."

Dimitri sighed too. "I suppose that makes sense. Dedue, would you mind giving him a hand?"

There was a click sound, and then Dedue opened the door and stepped out of the… well, whatever it was. Then he opened the door next to Linhardt. "Here. I will buckle the seatbelt for you." He pulled a large black strap across Linhardt, and it made a click sound beside him.

"Thanks, Dedue."

"It was no problem."

The purring sound started up again when all the doors were closed and everyone was inside.

Dimitri sighed. "Alright, are we all good to go now?"

"Yes, I believe." Dedue remained calm and patient throughout the whole ordeal, impressively.

Linhardt found himself wondering why Dedue was no longer addressing Dimitri as 'your highness', but realised that such a small fact should be the least of his worries at the moment. He then found himself craving a nap, so he indulged, and fell asleep.

—-

.

.

Linhardt woke up groggy and tired, his whole self being shaken by the shoulder. He opened his eyes to see Dedue shaking him from outside the door of the thing. "Alright, I'm awake, you can stop that now."

Dedue promptly stopped. "Sorry."

Linhardt simply shook his head and stepped out of the blue thing, and out onto the dark grey stone ground. He looked to his side to see that the were somehow now in front of a rather small mansion, or perhaps even a large commoner house. It was mostly white, but there were some blue trimmings. He assumed that it must belong to an extremely minor noble, or perhaps it was not a home at all. "When will we be arriving at Lanato's home?"

Dedue seemed to have had enough of reacting at all to Linhardt. "This is Lonato's home. I will walk you to the door."

And that he did, marching right on up to the door; surprisingly, it was the same size as the one at Mercedes' house. Or maybe not _surprisingly_, considering everything else, the fact that Lanato's house was small was trivial.

Linhardt followed Dedue up to the door, who had just knocked. A man around the same height as Linhardt answered them. He was rather muscular and had hair the color of mud, unlike his eyes, which were the same blue as Lanato's.

"Hello Dedue, I'm sure Ashe will be glad to see you." He chuckled softly. "Ah, is this Linhardt?"

Dedue nodded. "Yes, this is him."

Ashe suddenly appeared in the doorway from around a corner, and took his place beside the brown-haired man. "Hi Dedue!"

Dedue smiled gently, perhaps setting a new record again for most expressive Linhardt had seen him. "Hello."

The brown-haired man clapped his hands together. "Well, I suppose I should be letting you in!" He walked inside the halls. "Ashe, if you need anything, yell." And with that, he turned a corner the the right and was gone.

Dedue looked outside and waved Dimitri goodbye, then shut the door behind himself.

Ashe turned the corner to the left. "Just follow me."

Linhardt and Dedue did just that, walking down a long hallway until they turned right, into a room with a couple long red sofas and a plain brown table in the middle. The walls were a lackluster off-white, and there were two large windows each across from the doorway.

Already sitting on one of the sofas was Ashe, who had turned the corner into the room only a couple minutes before they had. "Please, make yourself at home."

Dedue nodded, and sat respectfully next to Ashe.

Contrast to that, Linhardt practically draped himself over the other sofa, taking 'make yourself at home' to heart. "Thanks for letting me stay here."

Shaking his head, Ashe smiled. "Oh, no, it's not me you should thank, really. It was the generosity of Lonato! Although, I do appreciate the thanks!"

After an awkward moment of silence, he left the room, then came back with a tiny box. "Linhardt, have you ever played Uno?"

Linhardt thought for a moment. "No, I don't think that I have."

The couch barely squished when Ashe sat back next to Dedue. "Would you like to try?"

He shrugged. "Sure, I guess."

"Alright, I'll explain the rules…" Ashe went on about the rules and how you could add cards that matched the last in either colour or number and whatnot as he sorted out the colourful deck of cards on the table.

Linhardt fanned out his seven cards in his hands. He could take comfort in being able to do something so familiar - even if it was something so small, like playing cards. It reminded him of all those nights he'd spent when he was young playing card games with Caspar. Whether it was _Knights and Wyverns _or _Chance,_ they would always end up having fun.

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Somehow, Linhardt ended up absolutely destroying the others. Not only had probability blessed him, but he also nailed the technique of _Uno _pretty quickly.

What had happened was that Linhardt saved up his +4 cards throughout the game. Near the end, Ashe was silently but visibly getting smug, having gotten down to one card. Dedue stayed unreadable, holding four cards. Linhard had four as well, until the second-to-last turn when he placed down three +4 cards in one turn, forcing Ashe to pick up twelve more cards. Then, after Ashe and Dedue went, Linhardt placed down another +4 card, which was his last card, and won the game.

Ashe gathered the cards into the box very quickly afterwards. "I think that's enough Uno for now."

Dedue nodded in agreement.

Grinning, Linhardt nodded too. "In fact, I'm going to sleep. 'Night." He shut his eyes and layed back down.

"Wait, you can sleep in my room. I have an air mattress set up for you and everything." Ashe smiled, seemingly over his Uno anguish.

Linhardt shrugged. "Nah." And then promptly fell asleep.

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**AUTHOR'S NOTE: sorry if you don't know the rules of uno. for perspective Ashe got literally destroyed haha. Thank you for the reviews. please let me know if i am doing this whole 'author's note' business wrong. **

**Edit: ok i've been called out in the reviews! I only know uno by house rules, so it's a bit incorrect here. **


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